


Ink and Flame

by BootsnBlossoms, TheOxfordEnglishFangeek (jadinacookie)



Series: The Mundanes [5]
Category: The Mundanes, The Mundanes (Queer Urban Magic Universe)
Genre: Ambrose Backstory, Canon Queer Character, Canon Queer Character of Color, Canon Trans Character, M/M, Magical Tattoos, On the Run, Original Character(s), Original Fiction, Queer Urban Magic, Rian Backstory, Telekinesis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-07
Updated: 2017-01-07
Packaged: 2018-09-15 12:40:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9235646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BootsnBlossoms/pseuds/BootsnBlossoms, https://archiveofourown.org/users/jadinacookie/pseuds/TheOxfordEnglishFangeek
Summary: “Shit, um, not that I want this to stop any time soon, because I really fucking don’t but we are kinda constituting a fire hazard right now with all these candles. I mean, don’t get me wrong, candlelight is a super good look for you, I mean you look amazing right now, but fire is generally not good.”The deep, rumbling laugh Rian got in response was not what he expected, though perhaps not that surprising given his rambling. Ambrose pulled back only far enough to meet his eyes.“I haven’t shown you yet, have I?” he asked, an eyebrow raised as he studied Rian’s face. For a moment he looked conflicted and uncertain, but the expression cleared and changed into a look of concentration. He closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths. A second later, all the candles in the circle around them slid away, giving them several more feet of free space.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place in 2008, long before any of the currently published Mundanes stories. A very enlightening peek into a formative event in the past of characters :)
> 
> Many many thanks to [rayvanfox](http://archiveofourown.org/users/rayvanfox/pseuds/rayvanfox) (aka [zooeyscigar](http://zooeyscigar.tumblr.com/)), who cheered us on and betaed the story to whip it into shape. Thanks, handsome <3

**September 2008**

Wet socks. Stinky shoes. Sweat clinging everywhere. Dirt under his nails. A total lack of anything sweet in his diet. There were a lot of things Ambrose had to get used to in this new life of his, and yeah, he thought he’d adjusted well. But this? He hoped he _never_ got used to this.

The sky was on fire. 

Charlotte, North Carolina stretched out in front of him as quiet as it ever got in a city of over half a million people. It was just before six and already the air was heavy with humidity and the promise of a long, hot day. The skyscrapers sparkled like gems against the glow of a sun threatening to spill over the horizon of pink, red, orange, and blue. Ambrose’s fingers were cold where he gripped the fire escape, but there was no way he was moving any time soon.

The thing about sleeping rough was that your internal body clock tended to sync up with sunrise and sunset. Ambrose half-remembered a discussion about human circadian rhythms during a dream manipulation class. The instructor talked about the fascinating effects of electronics and melatonin on normals’ brains. She left out how different humans slept when their bodies were in sync with the sun, though.

Ambrose swore at himself under his breath. He was trying something new. Don’t think about ho— **_no_** _, not home_ — don’t think about the Caste more than three times a day. It hurt too much. First, the ache of longing, of missing family, of a life that made sense. Then the shame of missing people who killed in the name of their ‘righteous’ quest, who used people for power. Finally, the anger at _being_ used.

The first rays of the sun slipped free of the horizon and Ambrose took a deep breath to try and stop his hands shaking. He had a plan. Take himself off the radar so no one could track him down. Spend a few days in his hometown. See for himself what phone calls couldn’t convince him were true: that his house had burned to the ground and his parents had vanished. No graves, but no forwarding address, either. He _had_ to find out, one way or another, with old fashioned boots-on-the-ground investigating. And if that didn’t work? 

Fuck that. It would work. 

First things first. Ambrose pulled the rumpled note out of his pocket that could be a ticket to freedom. Philomene Cheval, magical tattoo artist, Tryon St., Charlotte, North Carolina. 

~~~

Ambrose didn’t know what he expected from one of the most famous magical tattoo shops this side of the Mississippi, but this wasn’t it. It looked… like a tattoo shop. The walls were a respectable shade of beige. Framed, tasteful prints of the artists’ work hung in neat, even rows at eye level. The seating area wasn’t large, but the maroon couches looked comfy. Stacks of example books sat in tidy piles on the coffee table. 

It was only on a second survey that Ambrose started to see the signs of magic users embedded in nooks and crannies. Even then he only noticed because he knew what to look for. Someone had tucked crystals, herb bundles, and sigils over window frames, in door jambs, and around the edges of plant pots. A hint of burnt resin and sage hung in the air, and little gauzy mojo bags hung in discreet places. Ambrose got a strong sense of _negativity not welcome here_ and wondered just how much power those little booby trap spells held. He suspected that if he started causing trouble, he wouldn’t remain conscious long enough to find out.

“Hello?” he called out.

A small crash rang out from an open doorway towards the back of the shop, quickly followed by some muffled profanities. A brown face surrounded by a riotous afro popped into view, the person's expression falling when they caught sight of Ambrose.

“Hi,” they said, voice an odd combination of embarrassment and either frustration or annoyance. Whatever it was, they clearly weren’t happy to see him, their body language screaming ‘leave me the hell alone’ as they stepped into the main body of the shop. “Sorry, the door should’ve been locked, we’re not...” They stopped mid-sentence, a flash of pain racing across their face. “The shop’s closed.”

It took a moment for Ambrose’s eyesight to adjust to the dimmer light of the back of the shop so he could see them. The newcomer was tall — almost as tall as Ambrose. They wore a black and gray floral button down shirt over a white tank top and jeans. The overshirt was undone with the sleeves rolled up. A riot of black and gray tattoos snaked out from under the fabric. 

Ambrose took a few steps forward to get a better look. They were sharp featured with a lighter bone structure and the faintest hint of facial hair — just androgynous enough for Ambrose not to be comfortable labeling them male or female. He decided to stick with referring to the shopkeep as ‘they’ in his head until told otherwise. 

But their face. That was grief. Ambrose was close enough to his own that he recognized it immediately. He felt a flash of sympathy, followed by an intense twist of fear. Philomene Cheval was a name known from West Coast to East Coast factions of the Caste. She was a powerful genius at magical tattooing and fierce as a lioness. She refused to join any faction, but never refused to apply her talents when asked. Untouchable — that was the word Imogen had used to describe her. 

Apparently not. Had Ambrose’s flight from that world started some sort of terrible retribution against magical folk who wouldn’t fall in line? What was happening?

“I need to speak to Ms. Cheval,” he insisted. He took a step forward and tried to be intimidating without actually being threatening. “Please. It’s urgent.”

Their face crumpled, unfazed by Ambrose’s attempt at intimidation. Apparently the hurt they were carrying was enough to outweigh any fear he might have instilled in them otherwise. “Wish I could help you man, but we are both shit outta luck on that score, I’m afraid.”

“I…” Ambrose started, his heart plummeting. He relaxed his body language and stepped forward again, this time close enough to touch. Softer, and with genuine sympathy, he asked “What happened?”

Loud enough to startle Ambrose, they made a sound somewhere between a laugh and sob and shook their head. “Cancer if you can fucking believe it. All the stuff she’s done, the things she fought against in her life, kept people safe from, and it’s something as boring, as _normal_ , as fucking cancer that took her out. What a fucking joke.” 

“She’s dead?” Ambrose whispered. If his heart was stuttering in fear before, it felt like it had stopped the moment the shopkeep said _cancer_. He stumbled back a few steps and collapsed in a sorry heap on one of the couches. 

Ambrose hadn’t had _much_ of a plan, but it was all he had. Get a protection tattoo, get out of dodge (which was pretty much the whole eastern seaboard). Without step one, he couldn’t accomplish step two.

Which was… unacceptable. He was tired of hiding in the woods with Imogen, no matter how much he loved her. He missed cities and people and a sense of belonging. He needed something more than hammocks, campfire smoke, and chilly river-water baths. As dangerous as cities were for him, they were his home. But Imogen wouldn’t, maybe couldn’t, come with him, so he had to keep free of scrying eyes on his own. Cheval had been Imogen’s idea. And now that that was impossible...

He shook his head at himself and forced himself to look up. “I’m so sorry for your loss.”

“Yeah, me too,” they replied, sliding the sample books to one side so they could perch on the coffee table in front of him. “Sorry I dropped it on you like that. Phil always says...” They stopped and looked down at their hands where they were braced over their knees. “Always _said_ that I’m about as subtle as a brick to talk to.” They let out a sigh, pushing a hand over their mass of hair before looking up at him ruefully. 

“Did you know her?”

“No,” Ambrose said, shaking his head. “But she’s well-known, well-regarded, by a lot of —” He stuttered over the word _friends_ and swallowed it down. “A lot of people I know. She was recommended to me, to help me.” He sighed and looked up. “I’m Ambrose.”

“Rian.” They offered their hand for Ambrose to shake; for the first time their expression lightening into something approaching a smile. “I always forget about her rep, man. Like, to me she’s Phil and that ain’t no slouch to be as a person. I mean, the world deserves more like her, but to other people...” They shook their head then looked back to Ambrose. “Well, I’m assuming you know what she could do, given that you’re here and it weren’t on account of hearing the news about her.”

“Yeah,” Ambrose agreed. He looked at Rian’s hand and gave him an apologetic shake of his head. He knew better than to shake a magic user’s hand. “Sorry. I don’t mean to be rude, but handshakes aren’t a great idea for people like us.”

If Rian was offended, then they were doing an awfully good job of not showing it. And, considering how emotionally obvious they’d been up to that point, that seemed unlikely. It was still reassuring when they flashed Ambrose a small smile, curls bobbing as they nodded. “I hear you man, no harm, no foul. Handshake can wait till I got some gloves on, yeah? No bare skin to worry about then.”

“Thanks,” Ambrose said with a relieved smile. “Sorry about… earlier. I just… I wasn’t expecting that. I was relying on being able to use her services.” He looked around the shop, empty and quiet, and at Rian, who looked perfectly at home. “I don’t suppose you…?”

“Seven years working and learning from Mama Cheval herself, my friend. I mean, I can’t pretend to be anywhere near that good, but as substitutes go, you’d be hard pressed to find better.”

“Oh god, that would be amazing. Thank you. I don’t know what else I would do.” Ambrose felt himself sink into the couch a little. “You’re _actually_ saving my life.” 

“Well shit,” Rian said quietly, expression sobering. Getting up, they went to the window and started pulling down the blinds, bathing the small seating area in a muted yellow light as the sun fought its way through the fabric. “You cool if I lock us in? I don’t want any more walk-ins.”

Ambrose hesitated. As kind as Rian seemed, he felt a prickle of discomfort at being locked in with a total stranger. But he’d been quietly despairing since he’d left the Caste (and Arwel’s influence, the damned invasive psychic). Fatalism was not his style, but what was the point of a life always looking over one’s shoulder? He needed the scrying glass fooled, the tracking spells made useless. He needed to live without the threat of Louhi and Arwel, and their less empathetic counterparts, breathing down his neck. What could Rian do that was worse than that? 

“Great idea,” he said. “And I really am sorry about Ms. Cheval.”

Rian nodded and, crossing over to the door, flipped the latch closed. “Way I see it,” they said quietly, heading back to the counter and pulling out what looked to be a sketchbook, “best respect I could ever pay her would be carrying on her work, helping folk who need it.”

They beckoned Ambrose over with a tilt of their head and started moving into the back of the shop. They dropped to a crouch in front of a locked cabinet. Before producing any sort of key for it, they tucked their sketchbook under one arm and made a couple of short sharp gestures, murmuring something Ambrose couldn’t catch. Only then did they tug a set of keys from their pocket and unlock it, unearthing a small stack of books.

The symbols on the spines were achingly familiar, and Ambrose felt a rush of relief. 

“How did you come to work for Ms. Cheval?” he asked, watching as Rian spread the collection of texts onto the counter with something approaching reverence.

“I got lucky,” Rian replied, glancing from the books to Ambrose and back again with a contemplative look on their face before picking one up and handing it to him. “Start looking through that. Anything draws your eye or gives you a feeling you like, tell me.” They gestured to the chair to Ambrose’s right and hooked a small stool over for themself, flipping open the sketchbook as they sat down. “Course, Phil would call bullshit on that, mind; said I was meant to find her. Didn’t know it at the time but it was my gift that brought me here in the first place. Not that I knew I had a gift; didn’t know anything about this world.” 

They waved a hand over the books still sitting on the counter, briefly looking thoughtfully at one of them before grabbing it and pulling it onto their lap. “Phil knew, though; knew the second she saw me what I was.”

“And what is that?” Ambrose asked. He took the book and settled in the chair to thumb through it. He knew it wasn’t just an ordinary book; he could feel power coming from it in waves. The gel-pen-sketched sigil on the cover wasn’t anything fancy, but if Ambrose stared at it long enough, it started to look like a living, writhing, thing.

Rian smiled, something warm that lit up their whole face for a moment and briefly washed away the grief that had been etched into their features. “She called me a middle man,” they said, smile widening a touch further on the word ‘man’, eyes flicking up to meet Ambrose’s. “I feel connections, ones that exist, ones that _could_ , and I... join the dots. Help people meet people that they should, be in places they need to be for stuff to happen. Least I try to when I can, it’s not super specific or anything, just… feelings.”

“Oh wow,” Ambrose said. He looked up and smiled. “That’s incredible. And incredibly lucky for me.”

Reaching for a pot of pens, Rian plucked out a marker and pointed to Ambrose with it. “Or,” they said, with a faintly abashed expression, “I was meant to find my way to Phil so that seven years later I’d be in a position to help someone who needed it.”

Ambrose gave them a nod, even though he didn’t believe in fate. 

“I need a protection spell, something big and strong that renders me invisible to prying eyes,” he said. With as gentle a touch as was possible with his big hands, Ambrose cracked open the book and started thumbing through the pages. “Someone is looking for me, and I have no interest in returning to them. I don’t know if they’ll kill me, or brainwash me, or… who knows. I just know I can’t go back. And I can pay.” He set the book down, dug around in his inside jacket pocket, and handed Rian an envelope full of cash.

A flash of discomfort crossed Rian’s face as they took it, opening the flap and giving the contents a cursory glance before closing it again and setting it next to the pot of pens on the counter. “I’ll count it out later if that’s okay?” they asked, uncapping the marker.

“I honestly don’t care,” Ambrose shrugged, “as long as it’s enough. I just… this is important.”

“Right, right. Of course.” Rian said, flicking to a fresh page of the sketchbook. He began making swooping lines on the page, pausing to open the other book and check something. “This might sound like kind of an inane question given why you’re getting it but you got any idea of where you want this to go?” 

That threw Ambrose for a loop. He looked up from the complicated twist of lines on the page — the note said something about destiny and love — and squinted at Rian. “Design-wise?”

Rian shook their head. “No, no. Design’ll come organically as we figure out what you need, build up the elements,” they explained patiently. “I need to know where it’s going on _you._ ”

“Oh!” Ambrose blinked at Rian, sheepish. “My back? I don’t really care where it goes. Upper arms would be okay, too. Or chest, or over my heart.” He leaned back in the chair and thought about it. It hadn’t occurred to him that the tattoo could be anything more than functional. “Does placement matter for what I want?”

“Back is good, gives me space to work with.” Rian paused to smile at him. “In your case, a _hell_ of a lot of space. Placement can matter depending on what purpose the ink is for, but when we’ve got something that’s pulling double duty or more? It’s less about where and more about directing the energy flow.”

Something in Rian’s voice made Ambrose smile and flush. It had been ages since someone had flirted with him. At least, he was _pretty_ sure that’s what this was.

“I trust you,” he said, and surprised himself with the instant knowledge that it was true. “Do with my skin what you will.”

“Now there’s an offer you should be careful making to a tattoo artist; a guy could get ideas,” Rian shot back. An answering flush just started to rise on their own cheeks before it was obscured by their hair as they leant over the book again. Their attention flicked between it and the sketchpad for a couple of minutes, adding a few more lines to the drawing in the process.

“I don’t mind,” Ambrose said. He flipped to the next page and dragged a finger through the familiar runes of healing and health. He looked up at Rian and for the first time tried to make out what their tattoos actually were. He couldn’t see the whole picture, but from under the shirtsleeves and collar swirled black and grey lines. Some of the art was magical — runes and sigils blended into the artwork — but much of it seemed purely decorative. And abstract. 

Ambrose felt the blood rush to his face again as he thought about where the lines and circles and spirals might continue under Rian’s clothes. He coughed a little, choking on his realization, and cut off his stare to gaze intently back down at the book in his lap.

“You alright there, man?” Rian asked, seemingly unaware that they were the cause of Ambrose’s breathing troubles as they added another curved line to the pad in front of them. 

“Great,” Ambrose answered. It wasn’t a lie. “Just nervous.” Also not a lie. He’d never thought about getting a tattoo before leaving the Caste, and his single-minded search for the right way to go about it had blocked out all other concerns — including how much it was likely to hurt. Not that pain put him off. This was happening no matter what. He just had never really tested his pain tolerance before — beyond letting the bleach soak into his scalp long enough to sting in prep for dying his hair — so he had no idea what to expect.

Rian looked up at him then, smile soft as they set down the marker. “Everybody is the first time, you know, and most folk don’t have the reasons for getting one that you do,” they said kindly. “Shoulda seen me, I was a _mess_. Granted I had my own heap of shit I was dealing with, as well as first time nerves, which didn’t help. I mean, growing up I never thought I’d be the type to get tattoos, let alone give them to people, but look at me now.”

“You are pretty impressive,” Ambrose agreed. He hesitated. “What kind of stuff were you dealing with?” He regretted asking almost immediately, but he was desperate for a distraction — and to know that he wasn’t the only one who had to deal with some unfortunate shit.

For all that they seemed confident in their abilities, the fact that Rian blushed at Ambrose’s compliment made it clear they weren’t particularly used to other people praising them. They were quick to jump on to answering the question.

“Well, to put it mildly, my folks did _not_ take well to me coming out,” they said, scrubbing a hand through their hair. “I mean, my ma already knew I liked girls as much as I did guys — had since the time she caught me making out with Ruthie from Hebrew school. Way she saw it, so long as I didn’t let my dad find out, and married a nice boy when I was old enough, then there wasn’t any harm in it. Me telling them I was trans, though? Whole other fucking ballgame.”

They leaned back on their stool, elbows resting on the counter behind them in such a perfect study of ease that it could only be faked, and carried on. “Won’t inflict on you some of the choice things they had to say on the matter, ‘specially my pop, but soon as they realised I wasn’t gonna play the part of their little Jewish princess no matter what they said, they kicked me out. Told me in no uncertain terms that I weren’t welcome there no more. So I was out on my ass; baby trans boy with _no_ clue what I was doing, homeless and six months shy of graduating high school.”

“Oh,” Ambrose said, several observations about Rian suddenly making sense. The somewhat delicate features, the thinner wrists, and the long eyelashes. The black edges of the crop top peeking out from under their — no, _his_ — tank top wasn’t just another layer. It was a binder. Ambrose couldn’t remember any trans folk in the Caste, but that just might have been because they used glamor to present the way they wanted to. He wanted to reach out and comfort Rian with touch, but wasn’t sure it was appropriate this early in their acquaintance. “I’m sorry that happened to you. Being sent to live rough because of your family is bullshit,” he added with feeling.

“You ain’t wrong, friend,” Rian replied, sounding nowhere near as angry as Ambrose thought he was entitled to be. Hell, Ambrose was pissed on his behalf, anger curling in his gut like a spark. He suddenly had the urge to break something, to yell, to protest against a terrible universe that refused to protect the people that needed it the most. The violence of the feeling shocked him, given how rarely Ambrose felt that strongly about anything, and he curled his fists at his side in repressed rage.

In contrast, Rian’s voice was colored with a kind of tired acceptance that was, in its way, harder to hear than anger that could have matched Ambrose’s. “But I coulda had it worse. Met a few kids when I was living rough, and the shit they went through...” That was when anger seeped into his voice, a flare of heat that was unmistakeable. Rian’s eyes closed for a moment, and his hand flexed around the marker he was holding with a muted squeak of plastic. When Rian opened them again, it was with that same mild expression as before. Only the lingering fierce grip he had on the marker gave him away, and even that seemed to subside after a moment.

“Anyway, it was about nine months after that I fell in with this crowd and one of them had this ink that I could not for the life of me stop staring at. I mean, I was obsessed with it, and I’d barely even thought about tattoos before. The piece this girl had though, I swear it was calling to me. Asked her where she got it, ‘cause I _needed_ to know who the artist was, and she sent me here to Phil.”

“Have you… did your family talk to you again?” Ambrose asked, voice cracked with anger and fear. He both wanted and didn’t want to know the answer. On one hand, the intense disgust he felt at discovering what the Caste was doing was still a knife in his heart. On the other hand, he hated being on his own. Hated being alone. Hated being so completely separated from the people that had been his whole world for so long. He wanted to think they could change. He wanted to believe that someday, he could come back and convince them that what they were doing was wrong, that keeping order didn’t mean cutting down everyone in their way. “Have you seen them?”

Rian shook his head, bending back over the pad and turning over another leaf in the book. “Not seen ‘em, no. Tried a couple of times, went by the house, the synagogue, but...” Silence stretched out between them, and Ambrose could see him biting down on the inside of his lip. Hating that he’d asked, that he needed to know, he was about to apologize when Rian spoke again, words underscored by the rasp of the marker as he added more lines to his drawing. “I send my mom letters sometimes, let her know how I’m doing. Send her pictures of my art, that kind of thing. None of them have been returned to sender, no one’s showed up here telling me stop or threatening me, so I like to think she reads them and that they don’t just get trashed or burned. Keep hoping that one day she’ll write me back.”

“I hope she does,” Ambrose said, heart sinking. “At least she’s still there. There’s still time.” He quit resisting the urge to touch and leaned forward to rest his hand on Rian’s arm. “If you still want that. You, of all people, would find the way.”

Clearly not expecting the touch, Rian started slightly, causing a line to go off course on the paper. But he was quick to relax into it, looking up at Ambrose through his lashes, the beginnings of a smile tugging at his lips. “Thanks, Ambrose.” 

Ambrose nodded and leaned back. “So what have you got there?” He wanted to lean forward again to take a peek at the drawing, but it seemed rude, somehow. Back home — not, _not_ home, back in Charleston — the artists of the Caste tended to go one of two ways. Some would make their art huge, colorful, and impossible to ignore, splashed across sidewalks and buildings without shame. They didn’t care whether normals saw their art or not; most had decided that non-magic folk were too stupid, or delusional, to notice the way the lines would dance with power and intention. If they couldn’t go outside, they would start drawing on each other, laughing at the way conflicting magics would spark and sting. But the other artists were the complete opposite. They hoarded their work like dragons hoarded gold. They would shut their notebooks and glare the moment anyone walked too close to them, and the protective sigils on the covers of the tattered binders threatened unpleasant bodily harm if trespassed. Ambrose had no idea which of the two Rian was, but didn’t want to risk it.

Apparently he fell somewhere between the two because he immediately spun the sketchpad around for Ambrose to look at. The pad stayed on his lap, a hand curled protectively down one side of it, but his body language was open and he sat up straight so Ambrose’s view wouldn’t be blocked. Like the ink adorning Rian himself, what lay on the pad was fairly abstract at first glance, a series of interconnected curved lines, spirals, and circles seemingly without form. The longer he looked at it, though, the more he could make out a shape — like a skeletal wing or the bough of a tree heavy with fruit. 

“Wow.” Ambrose smiled as he peered down at the sketch. He reached out to trace the lines, but drew his hand back before he could actually touch the paper. He narrowed his eyes and tried to pick out some of the spell work. It wasn’t a straightforward, simple hiding working, which startled him at first. But after a moment’s thought, he realized such simplicity wouldn’t work at all. A hiding spell would be fine for normals, but Ambrose wasn’t hiding from normals. He was hiding from some of the most powerful wizards in the world. He’d look like a black hole against a colorful landscape — more visible, not less. But despite years of sigilwork classes, he couldn’t quite figure out the spell Rian had drawn instead. “It’s beautiful. And incredibly smart. But I don’t really… Explain it to me?”

“Oh, for sure,” Rian replied, that faint flush rising to his cheeks once more as he capped the marker and threw it to one side. “And you’re okay to touch, it’s for you. It’s not active yet, so it won’t do anything, and you can tell me if anything feels jarring or off. Some stuff has to be in there, but at the end of the day it’s gotta work with who you are or the magic won’t stick. It’s like... like the difference between buying something off the rack or having something tailored. Buying a ready meal or making it yourself from scratch the way you like it.”

“That makes sense,” Ambrose said. He reached out to touch the drawing, tracing its thin, abstract lines with his big fingers. He couldn’t even imagine the talent and control it took to sketch something so powerful yet so delicate, and the brilliance it took to make it all work together. Then he smirked at Rian. “Except that you haven’t actually explained how it works yet.”

“I was getting to that part. Sheesh, man, give a brother a chance.” Rian’s tone was mildly defensive but the grin that spread across his face was anything but — and _damn_ if it wasn’t a good look on him. “So, I figure you know enough about scrying and tracking spells to know that you can’t just throw up a shield and hope for the best, because people are gonna see the shield. I mean, they won’t be able to see _through_ it, but if they can see it’s there, then they got a target, and they can smash their way in. And if they’ve got a way to track you specifically, something with a link like hair or blood? Well, then it’s like a bloodhound; they don’t need to see, as it were. This though...” 

He paused, looking thoughtful as he glanced down at the drawing then back at Ambrose. “It’s a faraday cage, but, like, for perception. They’ll be able to see you but their eyes’ll just… slip over to something else without even registering what they were looking at. Scrying, tracking spell, all the same — they’ll see you but they won’t perceive. It’s like the magical equivalent of the Jedi mind trick, you know?” He held up his free hand and waved it in front of Ambrose’s face with a mock serious expression. “‘These are not the droids you’re looking for.’”

Ambrose surprised himself with a laugh, the first one he’d had in ages. He playfully batted away Rian’s hand and leaned back into the chair, spreading his legs and arms to get comfortable. It was probably an unattractive sprawl, but he hadn’t felt safe enough to do that in so, so long. 

“I love it,” he said with a careless laugh. “Fucking brilliant. I can’t wait to have it on my skin.” He shivered at the thought, not entirely sure whether it was because of the possibility of being safe from prying eyes, or if it was because of how Rian was looking at him. He was back to smiling again, cheeks flushed, but his eyes were wide behind his glasses and there was no missing the way they flickered down over Ambrose before coming back to his face.

“Can’t wait to put it there,” he replied in what would’ve been a smooth reply if it wasn’t for the way his voice hitched up in the middle. That had his cheeks going even richer in color and he spun away to look at the counter. “And, I mean, I’ll get some smaller stuff in there, too, like general health and well being, repelling negativity... There’s space for that in the empty circles, so...”

Yeah, there was no way Ambrose was reading this wrong. He felt the stirring of attraction deep in his stomach, beating a steady drumbeat in tune with gratefulness that he’d found exactly who he needed right when he needed him. Even if nothing more than flirting happened between them, it was more than he’d hoped for since coming back into the world of normals. He’d felt disconnected from most of the human race for so long. First he was secluded in the Caste, then by isolation in the woods with Imogen, then by the thought that he had nothing in common with the people around him. This sweet moment meant more than just attraction. It was connection, and, shockingly, it didn’t hurt. 

He untangled himself from the comfortable position he was in, standing slowly and quietly behind Rian. He gave himself a moment to think about the fact that Rian was trans — he’d never had a relationship with a trans man before — and dismissed it. Rian identified as a man. That was all that mattered. 

He settled a hand on Rian’s shoulder, the bright pink of his fingernails, which matched his hair perfectly, a stark contrast against the dark fabric. “Thank you.”

Like he had before, Rian jumped slightly at the contact. Ambrose felt guilty for a moment; years of practice had him moving much more quietly and subtly than his size implied. But Rian was quick to lean into the touch and Ambrose hid a sigh of relief. After a moment’s hesitation, Rian reached up to brush his fingers over the top of Ambrose’s, and he twisted a little so he could look up at him, hand still lying just on top of his as he smiled.

“You’re welcome,” he said softly, giving Ambrose’s hand the barest of squeezes before pulling back. “Course, you might not be feeling so thankful when we’re six hours into me stabbing you with a needle hundreds of times a minute...”

“Six hours?” Ambrose felt his eyes widen. He knew that getting a tattoo would take some time, and would be painful, but half a day hadn’t been on his radar. Not that he was going to back out. He needed this. “Well, shit. Should I take some Tylenol first?”

“Probably more than that, to be honest,” Rian replied looking faintly apologetic. “I mean, we’ll see how it goes but it’s complicated magic and I don’t want to risk rushing it.” He turned around to face Ambrose properly. “I can’t tell you that it’s going to be a comfortable few hours because it won’t be but we’ll take as many breaks as you need, ‘kay?”

Feeling faintly terrified, Ambrose nodded. “I think I’d rather not,” he said, swallowing. “Take breaks, I mean. I know a lot of meditation techniques. At… at the place I lived, we were taught visualization and some other handy techniques for a lot of levels of self-control. Let’s, uh. Let’s see how that goes.”

His fear must have been obvious because Rian was looking up at him with open concern. “Well that sounds all kinds of... interesting, but I ain’t looking to put you through the ringer so hard you’re gonna need that kind of thing.” He stood up and tentatively reached out to place a hand on Ambrose’s arm. “’Sides which, breaks are for me too, last thing you want is a tattoo artist losing their shit part way through and putting a line wrong. I said I was gonna help you, Ambrose, and that means I’m gonna do it right.”

“Thanks, man,” Ambrose said with a grateful smile. “I don’t mean to sound so…” He shrugged. “I think I’m just realizing how easy I’ve had it, that the idea of a tattoo is petrifying.” 

Rian was quick to return the smile and gave Ambrose’s arm a gentle squeeze. “You’re having something done to your body that’s basically permanent; to be honest, I’d have worried if you weren’t a little scared. For now, though...” He turned back to the pad and gave it a critical glance. “I gotta clean this up, add the last few sigils and anything you found, and then I can start setting up. You, on the other hand.” He took a step back and gave Ambrose a critical look of his own. “When was the last time you ate something?” 

The question startled Ambrose into a laugh. Of all the things he’d expected Rian to say next — _take off your shirt, follow me to the back, any bloodborne illnesses I should know about?_ — the topic of food wasn’t one he’d expected. 

Honestly, Ambrose couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten something substantial. Imogen hated packing food, so most of their meals had been snacking along the trail: berries, wild veg, fire-cooked small game, fish, stuff left in bear boxes by newbies who were sick of their packs being so damn heavy. And since hitting civilization, he couldn’t bring himself to stop anywhere long enough to do more than pick up coffee and something portable like a sandwich or a box of noodles. Being back in the city, and out from Imogen’s protection, weighed too heavily. For all the precautions he’d taken, for as long as he’d been free, getting scooped up by Louhi while sitting down to a giant plate of spaghetti just seemed ridiculous. 

And yeah, food sounded like a good idea, but his stomach churned at the thought of trying to digest anything just before Rian… how did he describe it? Stabbed him thousands of times over several hours with a sharp needle? The looming threat of being discovered was still a heavy breath on the back of his neck, too. The thought that they might take Rian…

“I’m fine,” he said. 

Rian’s look turned sharp and he folded his arms across his chest. “I’m gonna politely call bullshit on you there, Ambrose,” he said, something approaching iron creeping into his voice. “Shop policy is you eat at least two hours before getting inked, and given how you dodged answering my question, I’m gonna go ahead and guess it was significantly longer ago than that.”

He turned on his heel towards the door Ambrose had seen him emerge from when he’d first arrived and disappeared through it. The unmistakeable sound of a cupboard door, and then a fridge, being opened and closed echoed out into the main shop space before Rian reappeared carrying a few things, a faint stomp to his walk that hadn’t been there before sending his hair bouncing around his face.

“Time to chow down, big guy,” he said, dropping his small load onto the seat of the still vacant chair: bottles of gatorade and water, an apple, granola bar, crackers and a couple of candy bars. “I know your stomach is probably doing loops right now but I ain’t going near you with my machine until you’ve eaten at least two of these.”

Ambrose’s traitorous stomach grumbled at the sight of the food, and he ducked his head to keep Rian from seeing the embarrassed blush that was almost certainly spreading from his collarbones to the tips of his ears. He grabbed a water and an apple, amused and grateful.

“Thanks,” he said again. It seemed to be all he was ever saying to Rian. He bit into the apple, surprised at how amazing it tasted — it really _had_ been awhile since he’d eaten, maybe even a day or two — and had it munched down to the core before he knew it. The water and the granola bar were the next casualties, and he picked up a candy bar and a gatorade, slightly embarrassed at how fast he’d gone through the little pile of goodies. He opened the candy bar — a Baby Ruth, one of his favorites — and wondered if there was any way he could eat it gracefully. Peanuts were sure to get _everywhere._

“Have you always liked to draw?” he asked as he watched Rian work on the sketch.

“As far back as I can remember,” Rian replied easily, barely pausing in his work to look up and nod approvingly at how Ambrose inhaled the food he’d brought out. “Went through paper like nobody's business when I was a kid, my room was basically covered in sketches. Other stuff always seemed to take a while to sink in but this, this never felt like work, you know?”

“Not really,” Ambrose said with a massive bite into the candy bar. “I mean, I understand what you’re saying, but I’ve never really felt that way about anything. I’m one of those people who seems to catch onto everything just a little bit slower than everyone else.” He thought about how long it took him to realize what a terrible crew the Caste really was, then shoved it aside. “Once I get it, though… It doesn’t go away.”

“That’s a gift in and of itself,” Rian pointed out, stopping what he was doing to look at Ambrose properly. “Makes sense, too, you’ve got this steadfast vibe going on — it fits.” His expression froze for a moment in realisation and lit up, eyes going wide as he scrabbled to juggle the pad, marker and book onto his lap as he pulled another of the books from the counter. Flipping through it, clearly searching for something in particular, he let out a cry of triumph about half way through it and held the book out for Ambrose to see. “What do you think of that?” he asked, voice eager as he pointed to one of the sigils.

Ambrose set down the candy bar and leaned forward to look at the stylized flourish of a rune on the page. If he tilted his head and squinted, it looked almost like an A. 

“It’s nice,” Ambrose said. “What is it?”

“It’s you!” Rian replied, sounding almost giddy. “Well, no, not _literally_ you. It’s an anchor, the fixed point for the spell to hook on to, the bedrock it’ll sit on but yeah, steadfast, solid, dependable. Strong, like you.”

_Oh god_. Rian was blushing again, his skin getting richer at his cheekbones, and Ambrose felt an almost irresistible urge to kiss him. He leaned forward but caught himself. Rian was just too fucking adorable when he was excited. Ambrose didn’t lean back, wanting Rian to know how enthralled he was. 

“That’s quite the compliment, Rian.” He smiled. “That means a lot. Thank you.”

Apparently only just realising how close they’d gotten in his excitement, Rian’s eyes widened and Ambrose could _feel_ the way Rian’s face grew hotter before he reluctantly pulling back. “Oh, well, you’re welcome,” he said, not quite looking at him as he picked up his marker again and carefully copied the rune into a vacant circle on his drawing that, from its position, looked to Ambrose like it would wind up between his shoulders. 

_Huh_. Rian was a little more shy than Ambrose had initially thought. Or maybe he wanted to focus on what he was doing, make sure he was getting it right. Like he’d said, the tattoo was going to be a permanent part of Ambrose’s body; it was best if he got it right the first time. 

Ambrose wandered over to the pictures on the wall, chewing on the candy bar and sipping gatorade as he went. His nervousness, undistracted by Rian’s flirtation, hit him again in full force, and his stomach flip-flopped. Suddenly, eating hadn’t seemed like such a wise idea after all.

He set the remains of the candybar and the gatorade down on the coffee table and settled onto the floor in front of the couch. He folded his long legs under him with a grace achieved only by years of practice, and settled his hands, palms up, on his knees. He remembered Arwel’s words clear in his head. _Your worries are leaves on the current of a river. Acknowledge their presence, then let them slip by_.

It didn’t feel like much time had passed before the gentle clearing of a throat cut through his concentration, but the light had shifted a little and Rian looked significantly calmer as he dropped down on the floor in front of him.

“Sorry to interrupt, it looked like you were in a good place,” he said, a soft smile pulling at his lips. “But I wanted you to look over this before I copy it onto the contact paper.”

He held out the pad almost shyly then braced his elbows on his knees, watching Ambrose carefully for a reaction. It was a cleaned up version of what Ambrose had watched him working on, less haphazard than the first and tidier, but still with a fluidity and a vibrancy that looked not copied, but fresh from Rian’s imagination. It wasn’t all black anymore either. Instead there were highlights of white and grey that seemed to bring the whole design to life, as if it might just flow right off the page and up onto Ambrose’s body of its own accord. Studded throughout were tiny runes and symbols that seemed to pulse in the corner of his eyes, only to go still when he looked closer.

“Wow,” Ambrose said. He reached out to again trace some of the lines with his fingers. It occurred to him that this would probably be the best opportunity to explore and memorize the image before it became a part of him. Yes, it would be on his body, but tucked away in a spot it would be difficult for him to see. Impossible for him to see first hand, in fact — he’d alway need the help of a mirror. Somehow, the fact that he’d only ever see it reflected back at him seemed appropriate. “This is incredible. It’s perfect. And beautiful. I didn’t expect it to be beautiful. Just… utilitarian.”

“I don’t think I could do utilitarian if you paid me, to be honest,” Rian admitted with a laugh, rubbing the back of his neck. “I mean I could try but...” He trailed off, looking down at the pad and running a finger along one of the curves before glancing back up at Ambrose. “Why would I want to? If I can bring a little beauty in the world, then I’m going to.”

“I think that’s a great philosophy,” Ambrose agreed. He stretched his neck out a little and rolled his shoulders. Meditation tended to make him forget his body, and it was always nice to sink back into it again. “The world can be ugly. Everyone needs more beauty in their life.” 

Rian nodded. “Exactly that. I mean, I know you won’t get to see this once it’s on you, but there’s no reason you shouldn’t get to have something beautiful, and, I mean, other people will be able to see it. That is, if you want to show it to them. It won’t lose its effectiveness if people see or touch it and hey, why wouldn’t people want to see some beautiful ink on a beautiful guy, right and oh god I said that out loud didn’t I?”

Yeah, there was no resisting that. Ambrose leaned in and shut him up with the lightest brush of lips against his. “I don’t mind.” 

“Oh.” Ambrose could feel Rian’s cheeks heating up again but he was also smiling, teeth tugging a little at his bottom lip. “That’s good to know.”

“Good in other ways, too, I hope?” Ambrose asked, raising an eyebrow. 

“Depends on what kind of ways we’re talking about doesn’t it?” Rian countered. The attempt at banter would have been more successful if it hadn’t been ruthlessly undercut by his dilated pupils and the slight shudder to his breath as he exhaled.

“I could show you,” Ambrose suggested. He wasn’t usually very good at flirting, but something about Rian made it easy. Just two boys pushing and pulling, smiling and testing each other’s boundaries, finding something good in a sea of awfulness. He stretched his leg out next to Rian, his knee near Rian’s arm, and scooted forward just a little. It put him in easy kissing distance if Rian wanted to take the initiative, but it wasn’t close enough to pressure him.

And take the initiative Rian did, leaning forward to kiss him, his hand moving up to cradle Ambrose’s jaw. It was a small thing, little more than a press of lips with a faint hum of approval behind them, but it was soft and sweet and his fingers felt wonderfully warm against Ambrose’s cheek. “I swear I’m usually more professional than this,” he said sheepishly on pulling back, but there was no trace of regret in his voice or his smile.

Ambrose settled a hand at Rian’s waist and leaned in again. “I’m glad you made an exception for me,” he said. He kissed the corner of Rian’s mouth, light and teasing, before nipping at his bottom lip. “A real kiss for luck?”

Rian shivered a little under his touch and, to Ambrose’s surprise and delight, let out the tiniest of whimpers before nodding in agreement.

Wanting more contact, Ambrose slid his hand between two layers of shirts — not quite skin contact but as close as Ambrose was going to get without permission. His thigh pressed against Rian’s side, and he settled his free hand on the nape of Rian’s neck.

His first touch of lips to Rian’s was just as gentle and tentative as the first time. Rian’s mouth was soft and pliant under his, and Ambrose couldn’t help but grin before he deepened the kiss. He sucked Rian’s lower lip in between his before nipping it again, touching his tongue to Rian’s just for a moment. Rian froze for a split second, but it didn’t feel like a nervous freeze — it felt like a moment of indecision. Rian pressed back into Ambrose’s hand on his neck, a whimper of satisfaction barely escaping his lips, before falling forward into Ambrose’s mouth. Ambrose pulled Rian even closer, giving him what he felt Rian wanted — both a firmer hand on his neck and a deeper kiss. This time, when he dipped his tongue inside Rian’s mouth, Rian dragged his own along it, soft and sweet. Their bodies pressed together as they kissed, and Ambrose felt warmer than he could ever remember feeling before. The moment was precious in so many ways, and Ambrose was reluctant to let it slip away.

Ambrose could feel Rian’s hesitance as he pulled away — clearly he wasn’t in a rush to have the moment end either. “As much as I would _really_ like to keep doing this,” he said, more than a touch breathless as his hand came to rest on Ambrose’s shoulder and gripped onto the fabric of his  lumpy blue sweater, “we’re gonna have to get started if there’s any hope of us getting this done today.”

“Yeah,” Ambrose said. He closed his eyes and leaned his forehead on Rian’s. The threat of the Caste felt impossibly far away when Rian’s heartbeat thrummed so quick and close under Ambrose’s fingertips. But Rian was right. They had a tattoo to make. 

He pressed one more kiss, soft but deep, to Rian’s mouth. “How do you want me?”

~~~

Ambrose took deep, deep breaths as he settled onto his stomach against the chair. It wasn’t too much of an incline, but it was enough that he could turn his head and rest his cheek against the padding. He closed his eyes and shuffled through the meditation techniques in his head. The river worked best for anxiety, but this process wasn’t going to be anxiety-producing. It was going to be painful. 

Rian’s hands on his back felt good, but he needed to tune it out. Tune everything out. He didn’t know how delicate the process was, but if traditional sigil-making was anything to go by… Pretty delicate. He couldn’t mess this up.

He focused on his breathing. Three counts in through the nose, three counts out through the mouth. Again. And again. His heart slowed, his focus sharpened, and he conjured the vision of flame in his imagination. As Rian slid what smelled like an alcohol pad over his shoulders and back, Ambrose focused on growing the flame, steadying it against an invisible wind. It flickered and pulsed behind his eyes, steady and unsteady, bright and colorful against a black nothingness. 

The rest of the setup process followed the procedure Rian told him about after they’d finalized the tattoo’s placement. He shaved away the fine hairs on his back, pressed the contact paper to his skin, and transferred the design. A few minutes later, the whir of the tattoo gun started up, and Ambrose pushed it all away to focus on the flame. 

The first couple of minutes were the worst. The pain wasn’t as bad as he thought it was going to be, just lots of little pinches that made him want to squirm away. But as Ambrose settled into it, the feeling faded. The hum of the machine, Rian’s breathing, and the flicker of his meditative flame all blended together in a quiet symphony that pulled him under. Ambrose felt himself slipping into a deep level of meditation where there was no hurt, no fear, nothing but silent contemplation and the thump of his own heart.

Of course, the problem with being so deep into meditation was that, no matter how gently it was done, being brought out of it was rarely a pleasant experience. It was the sensation of cold that cut through first, threatening to smother the flame with the intensity of it. On its heels came a rush of sensation that reminded Ambrose of the time he’d fallen off his bike as a kid and gotten gravel rash all over his arms and legs where he’d skidded along the sidewalk. He hissed and opened his eyes to see Rian just in front of him, his hands, stripped of the nitrile gloves he’d been wearing, pressed against the back of his neck — the source of the cold that had brought him round. 

“Welcome back,” he said quietly, his expression one of mild concern tinged with disbelief. “How you feeling?”

Ambrose started with the smallest movement he could manage, a simple roll of his shoulders. A burning ache rippled over his skin, but it wasn’t terrible. He sat up slowly with a slight wince. “It’s sore, but fine.” He blinked to clear his vision, then wiped at his eyes. “How long did that take?”

“Hold on.” Rian flipped a lever on the side of the chair that allowed the back of it to be moved almost vertically, locking it back into position so Ambrose could lean against it whilst still sitting upright. Then he sat down on his stool and wheeled himself into a position where he could be seen. “About five hours,” he said. “We’re making good progress, super good in fact, but I need to give myself a proper breather, eat something. Otherwise I just know Phil is gonna come back and haunt my ass for pushing myself too hard.”

“Sure,” Ambrose agreed, nodding. His hair rasped against the chair, and he grinned, feeling a little high on endorphins. Then he noticed that Rian had stripped off his overshirt and his grin grew impossibly wider. Rian’s tattoos were even more gorgeous than he’d thought, twisting sinuously to follow the curve of Rian’s muscles. Ambrose licked his lips and chuckled. “Only want what’s best for you. Should I stay here?”

“Stop flirting, it’s super distracting,” Rian said, in a tone that suggested he was trying to convince himself that was what he wanted Ambrose to do. The fact that he was practically grinning as he said it while that richness that Ambrose was rapidly becoming a fan of crept back across his cheeks certainly didn’t help his case either.

“Stop being so adorable then maybe I will,” Ambrose countered with a grin. 

Rian gave him a look and pushed his glasses up to rest on the scarf he’d caught his hair back with. “I’m a magical tattoo artist, not God, Ambrose. I can’t do the impossible.” 

“You know, if the flirting bothers you so much, you could always try and shut me up...” 

Apparently Rian had already burned through what little resolve he had, because at that he wheeled himself within reach of Ambrose, lips pulled into a smirk. “ _That_ I reckon I can handle.” 

The kiss was infinitely more sloppy than their last one. It was nice, though, feeling Rian’s mouth move purposefully against his, breath hot and lips soft. Rian’s hand was cool and grounding on his neck, and Ambrose laughed into the kiss. Being held helped connect him back to his body, so by the time they pulled apart, Ambrose felt much more clear-headed. 

“You’re so —” Ambrose started, ready to sing Rian’s praises to the moon and back, but a pulse of something beyond the physical twinge of the new mark on the back of his body made him sit up straight. “Oh god. Oh my god. Rian. You’re so amazing! I can feel it! I mean, I know it’s not activated yet, but I can feel the power just under my skin.”

“Really? No-one’s ever said that before,” Rian replied, looking equal parts flattered and fascinated as he stood up, his hand leaving Ambrose’s neck to hover over where he’d been tattooing. “It must have something to do with how it’s interacting with your magic. What does it feel like?”

“It’s like…” Ambrose closed his eyes and tried to focus on the new feeling running through his body. It seemed both close and far away, deep inside him and impossible to see. He held his hand out for Rian’s again, using it to help ground him. “It’s like when you reach to touch a metal doorknob and you’re static charged. But not the shock that comes when you touch the knob. It’s more like the zing of electricity when you reach out. But everywhere.”

“Woah,” was Rian’s eloquent reply as his fingers linked back with Ambrose’s. “That is so unbelievably cool. You...” He stopped, tearing his eyes away from where Ambrose had felt them on his back to look at him, eyes wide with wonderment. “ _You’re_ amazing.”

“Well, if just laying there and taking it is what does it for you —” Ambrose teased, raising an eyebrow at Rian.

“Oh my god, Ambrose!” Rian shrieked, smacking Ambrose’s bare arm with his free hand. “I cannot fucking believe you just...” He cut himself off, jaw closing with a snap, then ducked down to kiss Ambrose in a clash of teeth and lips, his face a blaze of heat where it was pressed up against Ambrose’s. 

Ambrose chuckled darkly into the kiss, absolutely delighted. He really wasn’t one to just lie back, but he suspected he’d enjoy anything Rian wanted to give him. 

“What?” he asked, pulling back and blinking innocently.

“‘What?’ he says,” Rian muttered, pressing another quick kiss to Ambrose’s lips before standing up and resetting his glasses on his face. “And for the record, I am _far_ more interested in taking whatever it is you might have for me, capische?” 

And on that note, he turned and walked off towards the back with what Ambrose would have put money on was a deliberately provocative sway of his hips. 

“Oh fuck,” Ambrose hissed under his breath, watching Rian go. “And hell yes,” he added for good measure. 

~~~

Under normal circumstances, there was something decidedly beautiful about the tattoo activation ritual. No matter how many times Rian had performed it (hundreds of times, by now — either for his own work or to help with Mama Cheval’s), something about the crystals, the low lights, the reflection of the circle of candles in the ceremonial bowl, was sacred and stunning. But throwing in a shirtless Ambrose? Yeah, Rian was in a good place right now. 

Despite having to move from the shop itself to the apartment upstairs, Ambrose was still calm from whatever intense meditation space he’d slipped into during the tattooing process, and Rian couldn’t help feeling calmed by him in turn. Cleaning up Ambrose’s back in the bathroom, he’d taken much more care than he would with any other customer, humming quietly as he’d traced ointment over every raised line and the angry skin around it. Not just because he liked Ambrose, and not just because he liked the feeling of his fingertips dragging along Ambrose’s back, either. Ambrose clearly hadn’t been handled by anyone — let alone affectionately — in a while. He didn’t do anything so obvious as to flinch away from Rian’s careful hands, but the tension was there. As far as Rian could tell, he didn’t have any of the scars — physical or psychological — of someone who had been abused, so that was a relief. Maybe it was just neglect. Hugs didn’t come easy to a lot of people. 

Once he’d settled Ambrose in the circle, though, Ambrose’s demeanor had changed. He looked relaxed, comfortable, at home among the eclectic paraphernalia of ritual work. He smiled as Rian wound his circle of crystals and candles around them, expression trusting and open. He’d helped Rian slide the ceremonial bowl into the dead center of the circle, then folded his hands in his lap again and waited. His eyes sparked with the reflection of the candles and maybe something else, but Rian couldn’t think about that. As much as he wanted to see Ambrose’s desire worn like an open request on his face, Rian had a job to do. The entire time Ambrose had been here, he’d been been tense with the urgency of his need to be be invisible. He was clearly terrified of being found by whoever he was running from. Maybe once that fear was finally gone… God. Ambrose was already freely affectionate, steady, calm. Would he get even more so?

_Focus_ , Rian chastised himself. 

He pulled his original drawing out of his back pocket and set it in the bowl. 

Despite the setup, the ritual itself was actually simple. Burn the drawing, transfer the intent from the paper to the tattoo. The magic would be seared into Ambrose’s skin in a split second of fiery intensity, and then even laser removal wouldn’t be able to get rid of it. Ambrose would be protected forever. 

“This is probably gonna sting,” he warned. He crumpled the paper and dropped it in the bowl. “But only for a second.”

Ambrose raised an eyebrow, clearly amused. 

“Just focus on your intent,” Rian said, unable not to smile back before following his own instruction to focus. He closed his eyes and recited the activation spell used by magical tattoo artists for centuries. A handful of badly-accented Welsh sentences, a match struck and dropped on the drawing, a few sparks of blue and white before the paper vanished in a puff of sulphuric smoke. Ambrose doubled over as the paper burned, gasping as the tattoo lit up like burning coal. He broke out into a sweat over his entire body. Rian was used to seeing this, but he still winced on his — friend’s? were they friends? — behalf. 

Then it was done. The energy that had been building in the room had gone and the air felt sweet like after a long awaited storm. Uncrossing his legs, Rian shuffled forward on his knees and placed his hand on Ambrose’s leg.

“How do you feel?"

“Ow,” Ambrose said dryly as he straightened again. He rolled his shoulders with a frown, then closed his eyes. “The feeling is still there, but it’s a lot more muted now, like it’s part of me instead of just inside me, if that makes sense. But it’s good. It feels like it worked.” His eyes widened. “It worked,” he said again, breathless.

Wide eyed and breathless was _definitely_ a good look on him, and Rian’s mouth went dry. “Yeah well,” he said, swallowing a couple of times and resisting the impulse to lick his lips. “I mean, was there any doubt in your mind? I am after all, incredibly good at what I do.” 

“Have I mentioned yet how much I like competence and confidence in a man?” Ambrose asked. He stretched his arms and tucked his legs under him as he made to stand up. He didn’t actually rise yet, and gave Rian an open, honest smile. “It looks _very_ good on you.” 

Rian was fairly certain he wasn’t going to get tired of seeing Ambrose smiling at him, even if it did have the infuriating ability to make him blush. Less than a day in Ambrose’s company, with the looks he kept giving and the compliments and that _voice_ , and it felt like he had spent most of it with his face on fire. It was deeply unfair. It was also a pretty small price to pay in the grand scheme of things for all the _other_ ways Ambrose was making him feel, and Rian couldn’t help smiling back.

“Well there’s an incentive to let my ego grow a little,” he said with a smirk. “It does something for cute guys who coming knocking on my door.”

“Cute?” Ambrose repeated. His smile turned into a predatory grin, and he leaned forward onto his hands and knees. Rian’s brain had a moment to process the fact that Ambrose was basically stalking forward like a jungle cat before his mouth was captured by Ambrose’s. Then Ambrose caught his arms and laid him on his back, caging him in with his long arms and legs to kiss him thoroughly. 

_Oh fuck, this is happening_ , a small voice chimed in the back of Rian’s mind. The rest of him however was far more interested in arching up as much as Ambrose’s grip would let him to try to press up against him, a low whine escaping between his lips as he opened his mouth to let the kiss deepen.

Ambrose made a noise somewhere between a groan and a growl and lowered himself down. He didn’t settle his entire weight on Rian’s smaller form, and Rian had the fleeting thought that Ambrose must have incredible control over his muscles before he realized that they were, in fact, pressed together from chest to thigh.

And damned if it didn’t feel all kinds of good up until the point where they had to break apart to breathe, and he became super aware of both his binder starting to feel too tight for comfort and the fact they were surrounded by lit candles within uncomfortably easy reach.

“Shit, um, not that I want this to stop any time soon, because I really fucking don’t but we are kinda constituting a fire hazard right now with all these candles. I mean, don’t get me wrong, candlelight is a super good look for you, I mean you look _amazing_ right now, but fire is generally not good.”

The deep, rumbling laugh Rian got in response was not what he expected, though perhaps not that surprising given his rambling. Ambrose pulled back only far enough to meet his eyes. 

“I haven’t shown you yet, have I?” he asked, an eyebrow raised as he studied Rian’s face. For a moment he looked conflicted and uncertain, but the expression cleared and changed into a look of concentration. He closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths. A second later, all the candles in the circle around them slid away, giving them several more feet of free space. 

Rian’s mouth promptly fell open in shock and his eyes went wide, twisting his head around to confirm that, holy fucking shit, yes, Ambrose had just moved not one, but thirteen candles simultaneously and in multiple directions with his mind. “Fuck me, telekinesis,” he murmured, in absolute awe before looking back at Ambrose in sheer wonderment. “You have telekinesis. Ambrose, that’s _amazing_.”

Ambrose’s answering grin was just a little shy. “Thanks,” he said. Then he smirked and rolled his hips against Rian, the evidence of his arousal hard and obvious against him. “And yes, hell yes, to that first part. Though you, uh, you need to tell me how you like to, uh…” He bent his head and brushed his mouth against Rian’s. “I don’t want to make any assumptions.”

Rian felt his heart flutter in his chest, and if he hadn’t still been reeling from Ambrose’s little display of power, what he’d said would have had him staring up at him amazement. Rian hadn’t had much in the way of anything sex-related since starting his transition, and what little there was had been with either girls or another trans guy. So to have Ambrose being so sweet and careful, while simultaneously having his dick pressed warm and hard against him, had Rian feeling a rush of affection. It also had him going hot all over, and he could feel himself getting wetter at just the thought of having Ambrose inside him.

“Well aren’t you just the perfect kind of gentleman,” he said quietly, cupping Ambrose’s jaw to run a thumb over his bottom lip and smiling up at him. “You give me a few minutes to get rid of a couple of things and then I will gladly show you what I like.”

“Thank you,” Ambrose said. He kissed Rian one more time, deep and soft, before rolling to his feet and helping Rian up, too. “I’ll set us up somewhere a little more comfortable.” He stepped towards the nearest candles, stared for a minute, then started walking towards the bed. The candles levitated at Ambrose’s elbows and drifted with him as he walked.

Captivated by the display, Rian couldn’t help but watch for a few moments. Then the possible implications of just how Ambrose might be able to use his gift in what they were planning to do hit him and he had to bite back a whimper. He spun on his heels to shut himself in the apartment’s small bathroom. Trying to get a hold of himself with only marginal success, the first thing Rian did was splash cold water on his face, then he set about extracting himself from his binder. Once free of it and able to breathe a little easier, he pulled his tank top back on and unzipped his jeans to pull out his packer. Once that was safely stowed out of sight, he debated with himself for a moment, then stepped out of his jeans completely and shoved them in the laundry basket, leaving him in just his top and a pair of grey boxer briefs.

The last thing to come off was his headscarf. He smiled a little as his curls came bouncing back around his face, giving them a shake for good measure as he looked critically at himself in the mirror. He didn’t know what Ambrose was expecting to see and couldn’t help feeling nervous, butterflies coming to join the low curl of arousal still pooling in his stomach. Neither was strong enough to overpower the other, but the thought of how Ambrose looked at him, the feel of his body over him and his lips, was enough to push Rian away from the mirror and back out into the apartment. Of course, that was when he saw Ambrose, and he found himself having to grab onto the doorframe before his legs went out from beneath him.

Ambrose had also stripped off his pants, leaving him in a pair of red boxer briefs. When Rian was more focused on the process of tattooing Ambrose than on his overall physical presence, Rian had only noticed in an abstract sort of way how built he was. But now, with Ambrose reclined in an easy sprawl on the bed, it was so much more obvious. He was propped up on his forearms to keep his back off the bed, revealing flexed biceps and a taut stomach. His muscular thighs were spread, legs draped over the edge, and his head tilted down as he watched Rian through his eyelashes.

Rian’s earlier thought that he was like a jungle cat wasn’t far off the mark.

The candles were settled around the bed, far enough away not to be accidentally kicked over, and Ambrose’s eyes sparkled in the flickering light. He took in Rian with a slow, appreciative rake-over and licked his lips as he spread his legs just a little wider.

“Oh god,” he murmured, eyes not leaving Rian’s face. One of his hands slipped free to tease over the crease of where his boxer briefs met his Adonis belt. “You’re… _jesus_ , Rian, get over here.”

Tempting as it was to rush over right away, and a large part of him was screaming at him to do so, instead Rian allowed himself a moment to just simply _look_. It also gave him the time to gather enough composure so that his legs would in fact carry him across the room. Eventually, he pushed himself away from the door frame and padded over to the bed with only the slightest of wobbles to his steps. Slipping off his glasses and setting them on the side table, he knelt up on the edge of the mattress and looked down at Ambrose with something approaching a smirk.

“You know, my bed looks awfully good with you in it, I’ve gotta say.” 

Ambrose reached out and ran a gentle hand up Rian’s side. He smiled, soft and delighted, and pulled Rian by the waist — not enough to topple him, just enough to urge him closer. “I didn’t really notice the bed,” he laughed. “Too busy taking in the more important things.” He traced a thumb up over Rian’s shoulder, following the curve of a tattoo that had been hidden before. 

Shivering under the gentle touches, Rian was all too happy to let himself be tugged forward and wound up sitting right next to Ambrose, close enough to feel the warmth radiating from his skin. “See, there’s me trying to be all smooth and then you come out with a line like that,” he said softly, leaning down to kiss Ambrose. It was the barest touch of lips before he pulled back just enough that he could look at him and smile. “A guy can’t help but feel a little out done.”

“I think you’ve pretty much won all the points today, handsome.” Ambrose breathed out, nuzzling at Rian’s bare neck. He pulled back and ran his hands up and down Rian’s arm again. “Want to play a game?” he asked, a mischievous light in his eye.

“A game huh?” Rian replied, pretending to look thoughtful as if Ambrose could ask him pretty much anything in that moment that he wouldn’t say yes to. “What do I get if I win? I’ll have you know, I can be hideously competitive, it’s one of my less attractive qualities.”

“The game is that you tell me all about your tattoos, for as long as you can, while I do my very —” Ambrose pressed a kiss onto his collarbone “best —” another kiss to his jaw “ to distract you.” Finally, a last, teasing brush of his lips over Rian’s. 

Arching his neck to give Ambrose better access, Rian flexed his fingers against the bedcovers in an attempt to ground himself in something solid and not let out a whine of approval at what Ambrose was suggesting. “Sounds fun,” he said lightly, returning the tease of a kiss with another soft one of his own. “Though you still didn’t say what I get if I win.”

“Well,” Ambrose said, pressing a thoughtful hum into Rian’s skin. “I think you should get me pinning you down and doing what I want,” he said. “Within whatever limits you want to set,” he added firmly.

What little composure Rian had managed to cling onto disappeared at that, a whimper slipping past his lips before he had a chance to even try and stop it. “Sounds like a win for both of us, to be honest,” he said breathlessly, slipping a hand into Ambrose’s hair, a silent encouragement for him to carry on mouthing kisses along his skin. “Unless you had something else in mind for a prize?”  
  
Which, given how _thoroughly_ worked up Ambrose had got him already without seeming to even try, was the likely course of events. Not that Rian had any kind of objection – this was a game that, for once, he was happy to lose.

“I —” Ambrose started, continuing his kisses down Rian’s throat for just a moment longer before pulling back to look at Rian. “A drawing. Non-magical, non-functional, something you want to make just for me.”

_Oh_. Rian couldn’t remember the last time he had drawn something for someone else that wasn’t part of his work, and for Ambrose to ask so simply – not demanding, but a gentle request for something that Rian _wanted_ to draw – it had a lump rising in his throat. “Seems like a fair enough prize I suppose,” he said, praying that his voice didn’t wobble as he spoke, already picturing in his mind what he was going to draw whether Ambrose won their little game or not. Something with fire, he knew that for certain.

“Glad you’re agreeable,” Ambrose laughed. He moved back on the bed a little ways, then knelt in front of Rian. He took him by the shoulders, big hands cradling him carefully, and leaned forward with a little push. It was a clear invitation for Rian to lie back, and Rian didn’t hesitate in accepting it. Making the most of the opportunity, he curled his hands around Ambrose’s biceps as he leaned back, ostensibly to steady himself, but more because he wanted to see if they felt as amazing as they looked. 

“Jesus, Rian,” Ambrose said as he helped him settle. His eyes travelled over Rian’s eyes, his mouth, his neck. “You’re so fucking hot.” He relieved Rian of the need to respond by stealing a kiss, slow and teasing, before pulling free from him entirely. He gave Rian a predatory grin before slipping down his body. He knelt at Rian’s feet and wrapped his hands in a light touch around his ankles. 

Rian didn’t have any tattoos below his thighs so Ambrose didn’t linger there. He dragged his fingers up over Rian’s calves and knees with just the lightest scratch of fingernails through rough body hair. The touch tickled a little but Rian managed not to wriggle, though he did shift up the pillows a little so he could better see what Ambrose was doing.The tattoos on Rian’s thighs were much more extensive and he couldn’t help holding his breath, waiting to see what happened next. 

Ambrose’s touch became much more purposeful as he discovered the bottom edge of the abstract waves that spiraled up and around. He dragged a finger around the bottom most edge, from the top of his knee to the inside of his thigh, and bent down to follow with his tongue. 

“So I’m meant to talk about them as you do this, right?” Rian asked, barely managing not to yelp in surprise as the wet heat of Ambrose’s tongue dragged over his skin, causing his voice to hitch at the end of the question. Yeah, he had as good as lost the game already and it had only just started. Then Ambrose began to slowly move up the inside of his thigh and Rian froze as he realised just how close Ambrose was to finding one of the scars that crisscrossed the tops of his legs. 

Ambrose noticed. “No,” he said, pulling back enough to look up Rian with concern. “You don’t have to tell me anything, except when I’m crossing a line you don’t want crossed.” 

“No Ambrose, it’s fine, I just...” Rian let his head fall back, cheeks growing hot as old shame flared bright in his chest. “I have scars,” he said quietly. “From when I was younger, before I... Before I realised what was wrong.”

“Oh,” Ambrose said. He searched Rian’s face before shrugging and smiling. He bent back into his careful kneel over Rian’s legs. He put his mouth right where it was before, then licked a hot line up the inside of Rian’s thigh until he hit scar tissue. He bit a teasing kiss over the slightly raised ladder of lines, then licked again before sliding back down to the bottom edge of the tattoo. “Tell me about the design.”

  
Letting out a shuddering breath he didn’t even know he’d been holding, Rian reached down to slip his hand into Ambrose’s hair. The other arm he threw across his face to hide the tears of relief that had sprung to his eyes. A barely audible ‘thank you’ whispered through his lips before it was cut off by a gasp as Ambrose bit down. It took a moment before he trusted himself to speak without his voice shaking, and the press of Ambrose’s tongue as it traced the ink lines around his leg certainly didn’t help. Not that he wanted to stop, by any means.

“It’s the turning tide,” he finally said, feeling almost reluctant to break the quiet now that he’d found his voice again, but pressing on anyway before he lost his nerve. “Washing away the old, bringing in the new. There’s transformation in that, you know?” 

Ambrose paused, mouth close enough to the crease of Rian’s thigh to be an utter tease. He pulled back and settled over Rian. He rolled his hips to grind them together, eyes fluttering in pleasure before he opened them to look at Rian. 

“I first discovered my gift in the ocean,” he confided, smile soft and a little far away. “It was a day at the beach. We used to go all the time, my parents and I, getting sunburns and playing frisbee and hunting for seashells. My mom loved the spiral ones more than anything. I saw a big one, at least as big as my hand, but I wasn’t allowed to wade deeper than my shoulders. I reached and reached, and… it came to me. Fell in my hand like I’d called to it.”

Rian had been all set to whine in protest when the grinding stopped but he was glad he hadn’t as Ambrose told his little story. The look on his face as he spoke was so utterly captivating that Rian forgot all about getting off for a moment. He wanted to memorize that expression so he could draw it later, fairly certain he had never seen someone look more beautiful. “That’s so wonderful Ambrose,” he said quietly, smiling up at him in barely concealed awe as he stroked the back of Ambrose’s neck.

“It was,” Ambrose agreed. He reached down and tugged Rian’s leg up, encouraging him to wrap it around his waist. His smile was still soft as he rolled his hips again, the generous curve of his smile an innocent contrast to the sinful way he moved between Rian’s thighs. In fact, calling it sinful was an understatement as far as Rian was concerned, given the growing damp patch on his underwear and the noises Ambrose was teasing out of him with seemingly no effort.

“I’m not playing the game very well, am I? You’re so…” Ambrose slid one hand up and under Rian’s shirt to rest it over the sharp jut of his hip. “Distracting.”

“ _I’m_ distracting?” Rian said, impressed with his own ability to sound casual and raise an eyebrow when all he wanted was to grind up against the increasingly impressive hard-on Ambrose was sporting. “I’m just laying here trying to have a conversation about tattoos.” He may have smirked a little.

Ambrose laughed and pushed himself up — yeah, it was so fucking _hot_ that he could do that with one arm, Rian decided — to give him a look that said, quite clearly, _challenge accepted_. He moved over and down until he was hovering over Rian’s right arm. 

“Don’t mind me, then,” he said, mischievous and teasing, as he stared at Rian’s tattoo. He looked at it thoughtfully for a minute, probably trying to outline a plan of attack in his mind before tackling the abstract circles, lines, and sigils embedded in there. He started at the inside of Rian’s elbow, even though there was nothing there. He brushed his lips over the sensitive skin with a touch just rough enough to not be ticklish, and followed it with a scrape of his teeth. And fuck, Rian wanted more; wanted Ambrose to bite down, to suck a bruise into the thin delicate skin, wanted to feel the press of a tongue against his pulse point as Ambrose slipped his hand into his boxers and finally touched him. He didn’t say any of that, though, despite the pleas being ready on the tip of his tongue. Instead he tried to keep his voice steady as he explained the various elements of his sleeve, like he was supposed to. 

But oh god was it hard when Ambrose’s slow exploration of the tattoo was _torture_ , in the best way possible. Ambrose traced every sigil with his tongue, every rune with his teeth, and every bit of Hebrew text with his lips. Shockingly, he followed the words from right to left, and it was that of all things that made Rian’s breath catch in his throat. Stuttering slightly over the translation, he reached up and grabbed his own hair, pulling on it to try and let the sting of pain across his scalp ground him a little.

Even more maddening was the way Ambrose was slowly, but methodically, moving his free hand, the one not bracing him above Rian’s pliant body. Ambrose had settled most of his weight on his legs, the fulcrum settled deliciously between Rian’s legs, so he was free to let his right hand wander. First it teased at the elastic of Rian’s boxers, dipping just under the fabric to stroke the sensitive seam of his thigh before it travelled north. He stroked Rian’s side, scratching his nails at the same time as he bit at Rian’s arm, before moving even further up. He paused at the soft flesh of Rian’s chest, his hesitation clearly a question. In response, Rian caught hold of his wrist and pulled it up to his mouth, pausing in his explanation to press featherlight kisses to Ambrose’s palm and fingers. The temptation to take one or more of his fingers into his mouth and suck on them was hard to resist but Rian managed it, settling for briefly biting down just below his thumb before placing Ambrose’s hand directly onto his chest.

“Jesus,” Ambrose groaned. “ _Jesus_ , Rian.” He scraped his thumb over Rian’s nipple through the fabric of the tank top, fingernail just catching over and over again as Ambrose held on and teased.

Unfortunately, no amount of wishing that Ambrose would touch him had prepared Rian for it actually happening, and he let out a gasp, hips snapping up to grind against him. Ambrose groaned and pressed down, giving him a delicious returning pressure. He made it abundantly clear that Rian had well and truly lost the game but in that moment, Rian really couldn’t have cared less. “Do it again,” he whispered.

Ambrose groaned, bit down on the swirls of color over Rian’s collarbone, tweaked his nipple, and thrust down all at the same time. And then did it again. And again.

“Oh _fuck_ ,” Rian moaned, rocking back up against Ambrose as hard as he could, back arching up into the touch as his hands scrabbled for purchase against the bedclothes before he gave it up as a lost cause. Instead, he slid them around the back of Ambrose’s head and pulled him in for a bruising kiss, hips stuttering against Ambrose’s in a quest for more friction. 

“Not yet,” Ambrose groaned, pulling his mouth away from Rian’s to whisper in his ear. “There’s so much more. You’re so fucking amazing, Rian. So incredible. I want to know all of you.” Unaffected by Rian’s low whine of protest, he nuzzled at Rian’s neck, then switched sides and started in on the tattoo that started just over Rian’s left collar. It was a golden spiral with touches of dark blue, a perfect mandala based on the Golden Ratio, and Ambrose laughed as he started tracing it with first his fingernail, then his tongue.

“Just like my seashell,” he murmured.

Despite the fact he was _aching_ to be touched, Rian couldn’t help smiling at that, even as goosebumps rose under Ambrose’s careful ministrations and his hips twitched up uselessly. Frustrated wasn’t even the word. But to be the subject of such intense focus and to inspire such a heartfelt reaction was it’s own kind of reward and Rian felt his face getting warm again.

“Just like,” he said softly, running his hand over Ambrose’s hair in silent encouragement. Of what exactly he wasn’t sure, but so long as Ambrose kept touching him, Rian was happy to go along with it.

“Can I?” Ambrose asked, biting at the strap of Rian’s tank top and giving it a little tug. He let go and met Rian’s eyes, his own bright with arousal but tempered by seriousness. “It’s okay to say no.”

For a moment Rian felt torn, but it only took looking into Ambrose’s eyes, thinking of how reverent he had been with every touch so far, for him to make up his mind. Nodding shyly, he let go of Ambrose and let his hands fall back against the pillow above his head so Ambrose could slide the top off. “I want you to.”

Ambrose kissed him, slow and sweet, before gathering his knees under him. He dragged his thumb over Rian’s bottom lip, smiling a sweet reassurance, before settling both his hands just under Rian’s arms. He dragged his palms down, caressing over the tank top as he moved towards Rian’s waist. 

“You feel so good,” he said, voice quiet and reverent. He grabbed hold of the bottom hem of the shirt and pulled, biting his lip as Rian arched to give the fabric free passage away from his body. Ambrose’s eyes didn’t linger on Rian’s chest, though, as he tossed the shirt aside. His gaze fell on the tattoo that started midway down Rian’s ribcage. It looked like shattered glass, starting from a point of impact and reaching outward, waves of red deep enough to stand out against his dark skin and rippling outwards. The jagged edges and broken pieces along the outside were colorless and sharp, and it was on these that Ambrose spent the most time. He kept one hand in Rian’s hair, holding tight and unforgiving, as he traced the lines with his teeth. 

When Ambrose finished his exploration, he sat back between Rian’s legs, his knees folded under him, and tugged Rian up. He wrapped his arms around his waist and lifted, using his considerable strength to pull Rian into sitting on his lap. With the hand not settled on Rian’s back, supporting him, he guided one of Rian’s legs to wrap around Ambrose’s waist. Rian followed suit with the other, aligning their hips together in a sweet pressure. 

“Do I win yet?” Ambrose groaned as he tucked his head into Rian’s neck.

“You know, I’m fairly certain you...” Rian began answering, breathless. Then Ambrose began to suck on his neck and Rian’s words gave way entirely to an undignified squeak, and he ground down against the heat of Ambrose’s erection as his eyes fell shut. “I’m fairly certain you won a while ago. I kinda lost track.”

“Have I mentioned how good you feel?” Ambrose sighed against Rian’s neck, pressing their bare chests together as he kept up the rhythm of hips. “Your skin against mine… god.” He captured Rian’s mouth in another kiss, and this time the noises he made were as desperate as Rian’s. “But you have to tell me what to do next. I don’t… I want to do this right. You have to tell me.”

His hands slipped under the band of Rian’s boxers to illustrate his question and, god, if Rian didn’t think Ambrose was already all kinds of perfect then that would have convinced him. Sliding a hand down between them, Rian caught hold of one of Ambrose’s and brought it between his legs, guiding Ambrose’s fingers to where he was wet and so fucking ready to be touched. “I want to feel you inside me,” he said, gasping as Ambrose’s fingers twitched and grazed over him.

“Oh god,” Ambrose whimpered. He pressed down, then pulled away as if unsure that it was too much. But Rian’s groan and answering thrust seemed to be enough reassurance for him, and he started stroking up and down. He kissed Rian, licking into his mouth and sucking on his tongue almost desperately as he worked his hand faster. Then he pulled his hand free and laid Rian down on the bed, the gesture uncharacteristically rough. “Let me suck your cock?”

Rian’s eyes snapped open, pupils blown wide, and he stared at Ambrose, not quite believing what he’d heard. His body, on the other hand, was having no trouble processing the request. His pelvis twitched up as he felt a new flood of wetness slip out of him. “And here’s me thinking about doing that exact thing to you,” he said, voice managing to sound both low and faintly hysterical. “But if you want to then...god, yes, please.”

“I’ll give it a shot.” Ambrose couldn’t hide the faint twinge of nervousness in his expression as he pulled Rian’s boxers off. He spent a moment just looking and touching, rubbing his fingers between Rian’s legs, parting the wiry curls with his other hand as he studied Rian’s body. Rian flushed under his gaze, the rich colour spreading down from his face to his neck and chest but made no move to cover himself. He stretched his arms up over his head, a relief to his torso muscles, and Ambrose made a hungry noise. He moved back a little bit on the bed, giving himself room, then bent over.

At the first touch of Ambrose’s tongue, Rian started and let out a sharp and desperate little whine. Ambrose didn’t flinch, didn’t pull away, but seemed to take the noise for the encouragement it was meant to be. He suckled gently, always so determined to be careful with Rian, then swirled his tongue. It was a somewhat clumsy move, unpracticed but determined, and Rian _keened,_ his hips snapping up so fast Ambrose had to catch hold of him before he bucked out of reach.

“Fuck,” Ambrose hissed. He reached for one of Rian’s hands and guided it up to his hair. “Fuck you’re so good.”

“ _You’re_ good,” Rian echoed, tangling his fingers in Ambrose’s hair and momentarily getting caught up in the contrast between the vibrant pink and the brown of his own skin. Then Ambrose began to gently suck at the same time as sliding a finger inside him and Rian almost came on the spot. His grip on Ambrose’s hair and the sheets tightened, and he cried out as his back arched off the sheets.  
  
“Fucking hell, _Ambrose_ …”

It was clear that Ambrose had never worked a body like this before. He sucked a little too hard sometimes, and the movement of his hand was halting and searching. Rian kept twitching his hips to keep Ambrose’s fingertips where he wanted them, and Ambrose caught on quick. Whenever Rian gasped or moaned in pleasure, he focused his efforts on whatever had caused it. His free hand was a heavy, biting presence on Rian’s hip, holding him in place as he worked his fingers and tongue. 

When Rian was close, his breaths coming fast and heavy punctuated by little whines, Ambrose pulled away. Some of his careful grace had vanished in his excitement, and he collapsed over Rian. He ground his erection, hard and straining, against Rian as he panted in his ear. 

As good as having Ambrose’s weight draped over him felt, the press of his dick against him, Rian couldn’t not whine in protest at the lack of direct stimulation. His entire body seemed like it was humming, every nerve lit up like a Christmas tree, and he felt like he had been on the edge for _hours_ , his orgasm so close that he could taste it. Then Ambrose spoke and Rian felt something inside him pulse, aching to be touched.

“How do you… how do we...” Ambrose started, then shook his head and tried again. “I can come like this.”  
  
“Do you have any idea what you are doing to me right now?” Rian asked, aware of just how wrecked he sounded and not giving a solitary fuck about it as he gently tugged Ambrose’s head back so he could look him in the eye. Seeing how blown Ambrose’s pupils were, feeling the heat coming from his skin, Rian took him at his word when he said he could come as they were. As far as he was concerned, however, that was _not_ how things were going to go down.  
  
Rolling them so they were on their sides, super conscious of the tender skin across Ambrose’s back, Rian made use of the space and slipped his free hand between them and into Ambrose’s boxers to squeeze around the base of his cock, his eyes never leaving his face. Ambrose cried out and thrust into Rian’s hand, eyes fluttering at the stimulation.  
  
“Not yet,” Rian said, his grip tightening until Ambrose stilled, voice firm even as it was high and shaky with want. “I said I wanted to feel you inside me and I meant it. I don’t want you to do anything you’re uncomfortable with and I know this isn’t the kind of equipment you’re used to, but I can suck you off or we can find something, I just want...”

“No, I want to,” Ambrose reassured him, breathless and wide-eyed. “Do you have a condom? I wasn’t exactly expecting… _you_.” Ambrose’s expression softened and he reached to stroke the side of Rian’s face with a gentleness that was at odds with the steady thrusts of his dick in Rian’s hand. He pulled Rian close enough to kiss, his dick moving harder and faster the longer the kiss went on.

And it felt so good Rian was reluctant to end it, but he could feel Ambrose getting more worked up, the thrusts into his fist more erratic, and he wasn’t going to risk things ending sooner than he wanted. Than _they_ wanted. Pulling back from the kiss and letting go of Ambrose wasn’t easy, and the noise of disapproval he made when Rian stopped touching him certainly didn’t help matters. Rian had to force himself to shuffle back before he could be tempted to kiss Ambrose again, rolling over so he could find a condom in the box he kept next to the bed. 

“Time you lost the shorts isn’t it?” he said, pausing in his search to look back over his bare shoulder, biting his lip as he took in the view.

With an impatient grunt made softer by the silly smile on his face, Ambrose rolled halfway onto his back before hissing in discomfort. He propped himself on his elbows, pulled his boxers down, and kicked them off with a little twist of his ankle. Then he rolled back against Rian, distracting him with sharp little kisses over his neck as Rian dug around in the box. 

“Don’t mind me, I’m just going to get comfortable” Ambrose said. He shuffled closer until he was half on top of Rian, then bit down hard enough on his shoulder to leave a mark.

“Oh fuck me,” Rian said in a whisper, head falling forward and his hand going still. Ambrose didn’t give him time to recover, though. He settled his weight on his hands and moved his mouth in a slow, sharp, perfect path down Rian’s back. The little twinges of pain felt incredible; enough to make everything brighter, the edges sharper but not so much that it was overpowering. It was a fine line, but Ambrose walked it like the two of them had been doing this for years, chasing every moan and shudder out of Rian that he could, refusing to let up.

“Someday,” Ambrose said, voice a dirty promise at the small of Rian’s back. “Someday I’m going to show you the ways I’m more familiar and —” he licked a short stripe from the bottom of Rian’s tailbone just a few inches up — “ _experienced_ in making men feel good.”

The touch of his tongue caught Rian by surprise and he let out a small yelp. As the implication of just what Ambrose was hinting at hit him, Rian felt himself go hot all over and buried his face into the pillow beneath him. He was hardly inexperienced sexually but that was something he’d never tried, and he shivered a little at the thought of it. Then he realised that Ambrose was saying that he wanted to do this again, that it wasn’t just a one off but that he liked Rian enough to come back, and he felt his heart lurch in his chest. 

Suddenly he was incredibly grateful his face was covered because he felt tears pricking at his eyes, and that really wasn’t what he wanted to be feeling in that moment, not with Ambrose a wall of heat behind him and the promise of what was about to happen.   
  
He tried to shake off the feeling, rubbing his face against the pillowcase before any tears could fall and ruin things, and pushed himself back up, hoping his voice sounded normal when he spoke.  
  
“You talk a good game, Ambrose. I look forward to you delivering on it.”

Ambrose’s rumbling laugh was low and dirty as he knelt back up again. He grabbed onto to Rian’s hips, flipped him onto his back, and reached for the condom. Despite his appearance of control, though, his hands shook a little as he ripped the packet open, tossed the wrapper aside, and rolled the condom on. His face grew more pensive as he settled in between Rian’s legs, but it didn’t stop him from hitching up one of Rian’s legs and pressing himself slowly inside.

No amount of wanting it had prepared Rian for the reality of _just_ how good it was going to feel, and he let out a low moan, hooking the leg Ambrose had hitched up around his waist to pull him in. Rian’s moan crept up in pitch as Ambrose slid deeper. The slight burn where he hadn’t been quite stretched enough, and the sweet ache of being filled fought to be the dominant sensation, and Rian relished in both of them. Oh, he’d used toys, both by himself and with other people, but they couldn’t possibly compare to how Ambrose felt inside him, thicker than he was used to and hot to the touch. Then there was the sheer presence of Ambrose himself, warm and solid, his weight pressing Rian into the mattress.  
  
“Fuck, you feel amazing,” he said, slipping his hand into Ambrose’s hair and pulling him in for a kiss, clenching down around his cock as their tongues met.

“You too, _jesus_ , Rian,” Ambrose breathed out. His eyes fluttered shut and he dropped his head to rest his forehead against Rian’s. He let go of Rian’s leg and reached up to tangle their hands together, breathing deep and steady for a few minutes. Rian could feel Ambrose’s other arm, which supported all of his weight, trembling with the effort of holding still.

When he thrust, it was harder than Rian expected given the gentleness of his other movements. It seemed to be more than Ambrose expected, too, because he made a soft noise of surprise and shifted a little.

“Sorry,” he whispered with a tiny laugh. He pressed an apologetic kiss to Rian’s lips and opened his eyes to smile down at him. “It’s different. Good — _amazing_ — but different.” When he started to move again, it was slower, more tentative, and his eyes fluttered closed again. Little noises of pleasure escaped his barely-open mouth, and his hand tightened in Rian’s as he grew more confident. His movements came faster, harder, and more consistent within a few minutes, and he shifted his hips a few times until he was sliding just the right way to make Rian’s breath catch.

“God yes, right there,” he moaned, tentatively pushing up against the grip Ambrose had on his hand and hoping he would push back. 

“Fuck,” Ambrose whimpered. He opened his eyes to stare down at Rian, and his mouth twitched as if he wanted to smile. He let go of Rian’s hip and grabbed Rian’s free hand, then crushed his wrists together in a, strong unforgiving grip that Rian couldn’t break free of if he tried. Ambrose had enough height on Rian that it wasn’t a stretch, and he started fucking into him with strong, relentless thrusts that shook the bed.

Before Rian could gather any rational response, even if it were just to scream out his gratitude, Ambrose grunted and pulled away. He was on his knees between Rian’s legs before it’d sunk in that he’d moved, and he used his considerable strength to pull Rian into his lap again. He fucked up into Rian as he pulled him down into his lap, crying out as his cock sank deep.  One hand  gripped Rian’s wrists behind his back, his bicep an immovable force between Rian’s shoulder blades, keeping him steady, keeping him still, as Ambrose thrust harder. And faster. And harder.  The other hand went between Rian’s legs,  thumb pressing hard, perfect circles over just the right spot.

And _fuck_ Rian was so close to coming. His whole body felt as though it were pulled tight like the strings on a violin and Ambrose was pulling every note out of him that he could. In the back of his mind, Rian noted that he had pretty much lost his ability to use actual words. Instead a litany of sighs, moans, and whimpers were falling from his lips, a babble of nonsense steadily rising in volume and pitch where the only discernible word was Ambrose’s name. Struggling slightly against the grip around his wrists, he let out a particularly sharp sounding cry as Ambrose tightened his grip on them. Rian rocked forward as much as their positions would allow to grind against Ambrose’s hand.

“You first,” Ambrose panted, keeping the hand between Rian’s legs moving in a hard and steady circle so Rian could do what he wanted. “You come first. I… I need that. I need to see you, hear you. That’s… I need it, Rian. You’re so fucking amazing. Come, please. _Jesus_ , please come.”

If his face hadn’t already been flushed to the roots of his hair, that would have done it. Hearing Ambrose plead like that made Rian giddy, the softness in Ambrose’s voice in such contrast to the way he was moving inside him and the relentless press of his hand. Scrambling for words that he couldn’t find to try and reply, he ended up nodding frantically instead as he ground down as hard as the erratic thrusting of his hips would allow.

It seemed that Ambrose was determined to take that as a challenge. He leaned back to take in Rian’s expression, eyes clearing from sheer lust to something a little more intent. His jaw clenched a little and his grip tightened enough that Rian thought he might have bruises tomorrow. The movement of his hips didn't slow but became more focused. He thrusted hard and fast, glancing down every once in awhile; to admire the view or to make sure he was hitting the right spot, Rian couldn't tell.

Then he started to talk.

“Jesus, Rian, you look so fucking good like this. Held back, pinned by my hands, taking my cock like a good boy. Look at you, breathing so fucking hard I could steal it with a kiss. Make your lungs stop heaving until I let you. Make you dizzy and light-headed while I keep fucking you, keep you held tight on my dick. Would you like that, Rian?”

Whether out of mercy or impatience — Rian couldn't guess — Ambrose didn't wait for an answer. He took Rian’s mouth in a rough, deep kiss full of biting teeth and forceful tongue. He pulled the desperate noises Rian was making right out of his mouth… and kept going even when there were none left.

Rian had no idea how Ambrose was able to say exactly the right things, like he had plucked them straight out of his unconscious, but combined with his voice as well? Rian was utterly defenseless. A tiny voice in the back of his mind wondered if maybe that was a gift of Ambrose’s as well and Rian would have let out a hysterical giggle if his mouth wasn’t thoroughly occupied. His chest was heaving where it was pressed against Ambrose’s and the sweet ache in his lungs was mirrored by the ones in his shoulders where Ambrose had his hands pulled back so tightly and in his thighs where they were spread wide across Ambrose’s legs. Not to mention how full he felt, stretched so much it was on the edge of painful.   
  
Rian was going to be feeling this for _days_ and it was that thought, accompanied by the giddy rush of oxygen that came when Ambrose broke the kiss and let him breathe that pushed Rian over the edge. Letting out a wail, he fell spectacularly to pieces, a full body tremor wracking through him that was so strong, Ambrose had to sacrifice his grip on Rian’s wrists in order to catch him and stop the two of them from toppling over.

“Oh god, Rian, fuck!” Ambrose gave up his concentrated, careful movements and started thrusting wildly. His arms were a vice around Rian’s body, unforgiving bars of strength holding him close as he fucked up into him, little noises of desperation escaping his lips. He was beautiful like this, eyes wide and focused on Rian’s face, little beads of sweat gathering at his hairline, skin glowing with exertion. 

Then Ambrose froze, all the muscles tightening in his body as he held Rian closed and shook. He closed his eyes, let his mouth drop open, and threw his head back as his orgasm rippled through his body. After a moment of still silence, he pumped his hips hard, and again, and again until his body was sated. He whispered curses and Rian’s name in his ear, biting gentle kisses into the side of his neck as the last of the aftershocks twitched through him. 

For a long moment, neither of them moved. Even when Ambrose was finished, he wouldn’t let Rian go. His arms tightened as he caught his breath, their bodies pressed together everywhere they were touching. Ambrose let his forehead fall onto Rian’s shoulder, and his breath puffed hot over his skin when he let out a satisfied sigh. 

“You’re fucking amazing, Rian, do you know that?” He squeezed him for a second before letting his whole body relax. “Thank you.”

Rian let out a pleased sounding little hum, knowing he probably looked like the cat that had caught the proverbial canary as he rubbed his cheek against Ambrose’s hair.  
  
“And here I was about to say the same thing about you,” Rian said with a smile, voice husky from where he’d been crying out. “I mean, _fuck_. You are…you’re so…” He let out a little huff at his own lack of articulacy and leaned back a little, winding a hand around Ambrose’s neck and slipping the other under Ambrose’s jaw to lift his chin. “You are beyond words Ambrose.”

Rian smiled and pressed a soft kiss to his forehead, then to his nose, then one that lasted a fraction longer to his lips. Ambrose hummed appreciatively and laughed as he rubbed his nose against Rian’s. It seemed almost ludicrously chaste given what they’d just been doing, that Ambrose was still buried inside him, but Rian didn’t care. He had just been given something precious and he intended to show Ambrose just how much that meant to him.  
  
“And don’t thank me just yet big guy, I’ve still got plans for you before you get to leave this bed.”

Ambrose laughed and gently guided Rian onto his back on the bed. He pulled out with a wince, pulled off the condom, and got up to plod over to the bathroom. He came back with a warm, damp washcloth that he handed over almost shyly. He settled himself on his side next to Rian and started a slow, gentle stroke up and down his side.

“I don’t know how much good I’m gonna be for you,” Ambrose admitted. “It’s been a long time since I didn’t go to sleep with the sunset.”

  
“Then sleep,” Rian said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, propping himself up on his elbow to look down at Ambrose, his expression utterly open and hopelessly fond. “I owe someone a drawing anyway, it’d give me time to work on it.” Never mind the fact that his insomnia had reared its head again since Phil had died and Rian wasn’t expecting to get any sleep himself, tempting as it would be to try while curled up around Ambrose.  
  
“Then when you wake up…” His eyes flicked down to where’s Ambrose’s cock was laying soft against his leg and he smirked, looking back up to meet his gaze.

“You’re fucking perfect,” Ambrose laughed. He groaned and flopped half on top of Rian, chuckling in his ear as he pulled him close. Letting himself be pushed back down to lying flat by Ambrose’s weight, Rian found himself chuckling a little as Ambrose snuggled into him, their arms wrapping around each other’s waists. Ambrose reached out to root around for the blanket and pulled it up around them. “Stay with me? Just for a minute? Until I fall asleep?” he asked, nuzzling into Rian’s neck.

The chuckle died on his lips at Ambrose’s request, and for a moment, he found himself unable to speak around the lump that had sprung up in his throat. Instead he settled for nodding, pressing another kiss to Ambrose’s hair and pulling the two of them even closer together, hooking one his calves over Ambrose’s legs.  
  
When the lump shifted, he risked speaking again, his voice barely more than a whisper and mostly muffled by the top of Ambrose’s head. “Can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be.”

~~~

Ambrose woke up from his second nap smiling. He stretched in the sheets and rolled over to take in the gorgeous view of Rian, propped up in bed, still gloriously naked except for his glasses, sketching away in his notebook. There was a little crinkle between his eyes as he concentrated, and it made Ambrose grin. He ran his hand up the inside of Rian’s leg and rubbed his thumb in gentle sweeps over the sensitive skin. His cock twitched in interest, but he knew he wasn’t going to be able to get it up again. Rian had only let him sleep for a few hours last night before waking him up with what started as a sweet, slow blow job. Rian was obviously out of practice — he kept choking and pulling back, only to start over again more determined than ever — but it didn’t take him long to get back in the rhythm of it. Ambrose had drawn it out as much as he could because he liked seeing Rian on his knees, staring up at him through his long eyelashes. His hair, which had already been a chaotic wreck even before they’d gone to bed, had become a wild riot that Ambrose couldn’t help but use as a handhold. Then Rian had begged him to fuck his face, and, well…

Ambrose’s cock struggled to get hard at the memory.

Rian, being the kind and generous lover that he was, had let him fall back asleep for a few more hours before waking him up again, this time for a joint shower.

Ambrose would never look at detachable shower heads the same way again.

“Morning, handsome,” he croaked. He gave a scratchy laugh and kissed Rian’s side. “Did you sleep at all?”

Pausing what he was doing, Rian’s expression of concentration dissolved into a smile and, bracing the sketchbook more firmly against his knees, he reached across with his free hand to stroke over Ambrose’s hair.  
  
“A little, thanks to you,” he said, voice soft. “Maybe not as much as I would like but more than I would’ve got if I was here by myself. So, you know, another reason to be happy that you’re here.” He leaned down towards Ambrose, glasses slipping down his nose a little in the process, and his voice dropped into a conspiratorial whisper. “For the record, that list is pretty damn long.”

Ambrose pushed himself up so he could meet Rian halfway for a kiss. He pulled away before he could risk jostling the notebook, though, and pulled himself up into a sitting position. He scooted on the bed to get closer to Rian until they were pressed together all along their sides, and slid his hand behind Rian’s back. 

“I haven’t felt this good about being _anywhere_ in a long time, Rian,” he said, his stomach dropping a little at what he knew he had to say. “You’re amazing, and I want to stay, but I… you could be in danger because of me. I have to leave, but as long as the tattoo works, it will only be for a little while.”

Rian’s face fell, and with it the heavy feeling in Ambrose's stomach sank further. A tension that hadn't been there before flooded up Rian’s spine so fast Ambrose could have sworn he felt the skin ripple beneath his hand. 

“I know you do,” Rian finally said, so quietly that had Ambrose not been sitting so close he would have missed it.

“Let me tell you what happened,” Ambrose begged, cursing himself for breaking their happy relaxation so soon. He stroked a hand up and down Rian’s back, desperate for Rian to understand. “Please. You need to know who I’m running from, and why. And most importantly, what they’re capable of. You have to be safe, you _have_ to be, and if I stay, you won’t be.”

Rian curled in a little on himself, looking intently down at the drawing in front of him as he bit down on his lip, and for a moment Ambrose held his breath, heart beating a steady rhythm of fear in his chest. Then Rian set down the sketchbook and pencil on the floor beside the bed and turned so he was looking at Ambrose straight on.

“Tell me. I want to understand.”

Relief rushed through Ambrose’s body, quicker and more heady than any drug or alcohol. Ambrose gripped Rian’s waist gratefully. 

“I told you how I found my gift as a kid playing around with shells in the ocean, right?” Ambrose started, and Rian nodded his head. “Well, I was young and stupid and thought I was a superhero. I told everyone who would listen — my friends on the playground, my parents, my teachers. Most people thought I was joking, or playing pretend, so they didn’t take me seriously. But then I started showing people. I wasn’t very good back then — I could only move things a few inches here, a few inches there — but it was enough. My parents told me to knock it off. That the folks in our neighborhood would think…” He cut himself off and tried to remember.

“But it wasn’t the priest who came knocking on our door just a few weeks later. It was a woman, Louhi, and her little goon squad. They introduced themselves as recruiters from a school for kids with special abilities. I was so excited, Rian. It was like I was suddenly dropped into the middle of a magical adventure novel. I don’t remember what my parents’ reactions were. I just remember Louhi shaking my hand, welcoming me to the Caste and telling me how powerful I was going to be.”

Ambrose paused. He wanted to slide back down into bed, wrap his arms around Rian, hide under the blankets. But Rian was watching him with a thoughtful, steady gaze that Ambrose couldn’t hide from. He did, however, slip his hand into Ambrose’s and squeezed his fingers gently, a silent encouragement to go on.

“I was with them for years, learning magic alongside the same math and social studies and history everyone else learns. I was surrounded by kids like me, the powerful ones who were destined to become great in the world of mere mortals. It was amazing. I loved it.

“What I didn’t know was that the reason I was so happy? The reason I was never homesick, the reason none of us questioned our presence in the school? It was because of a very powerful wizard there named Arwel, whose talent is a form of mind control. He suppressed all of our memories, keeping the past — anything that happened before we were recruited — fuzzy at best. Even now, after so long away, it’s still fuzzy.” 

“That’s horrifying,” Rian interjected, his face twisting in disgust. “How could they do something like that? To _children!_ ”

“That’s not even the worst of it,” Ambrose admitted. He closed his eyes and shook his head, shame welling up inside. “When I was old enough, Louhi decided I’d be great on her recruitment squad. I didn’t question it, I was just thrilled to be there. I did a little bit of training — interacting with normals, persuasive talking to non-magical folk, that sort of thing — and then I went on my first mission. Her name was Angie, and she was a firestarter.”

He had to stop there for a minute, eyes closed against the memories, choking on his own words. He opened them again, blinking away tears he hadn’t noticed, and grabbed Rian’s hands.

“I didn’t know,” he said fiercely, needing Rian to understand before he finished talking. “I swear, Rian, I didn’t know.”

“Oh baby...” Rian’s voice cracked as he spoke and before Ambrose could process what was happening, Rian was pulling his hands out of Ambrose’s and practically climbing into his lap to wrap his arms around him in a hug. “It’s okay, whatever it was, if they made you do something, it’s not your fault.”

“I killed people, Rian,” Ambrose muttered miserably. “I didn’t know that’s what I was doing. I thought we were just going to scare them, force them into cooperating, make them see what we could do. I was so eager to please Lou, show her how powerful I could be. I did what she asked without even thinking about it. I cracked the wall and I brought down the house before I knew the parents were still inside. And Angie never knew what happened. We drove away before she could see, and then we got to Arwel and she forgot —”

A few more tears escaped, but that was all he had left. He held onto Rian so tight that he was afraid of leaving bruises. Rian didn’t say anything, but his embrace didn’t falter either. Instead, he pressed their foreheads together and Ambrose just clutched him close and shook, dimly aware of the wetness streaking Rian’s cheeks.

“That’s when I left,” Ambrose said when he thought his voice would cooperate. “The next day. I cashed in favors, packed everything that was important, and ran. I’ve been careful, using every trick I know, but I can’t keep up like this. I’ve been staying with a friend who can shield me, but I can’t… I can’t. Anymore. That’s why I came here. And why I can’t stay. Even if the sigil is working now, I was here long enough before the activation spell… They only need a day or two of me being on the radar to find me.”

“What about Phil’s wards though?” Rian interjected. “I mean, won’t they do something? She would’ve known about these guys, and the shop isn’t unprotected.” 

“Ms. Cheval was incredibly powerful,” Ambrose said. He pulled back and wiped at his eyes. “Everyone knew about her, inside and outside the Caste. She was too fierce, too well-connected because of all the people she’s helped, for them to mess with her. Her sigil work has always been better than anyone else’s, _ever_. That’s why I knew to come here.”

**“** And they’ll know _why_ you came here.” Rian sounded utterly defeated, the implications of Ambrose’s explanation clearly hitting him. “The wards won’t matter will they? And even if they did, it’s not like Phil’s here to...” He took a shuddering breath and let his head hang forward. “She’d know how to help you, make it safe for you to stay here.”

“I…” Ambrose started to say, then cut himself off. Rian had been so full of life, so full of laughter and smiles, that Ambrose had momentarily forgot about his loss, his grief. He gathered Rian in his arms and moved so they both could lie back in the bed. He tangled their legs together and settled them so that Rian’s head rested on his bicep, preserving their eye contact. “I wanted to learn from her. How she managed on her own, how she remained separate without having to hide.” He shrugged and brushed his thumb in soothing circles over Rian’s lower back. “But I can learn on my own.”

“I wish I could do more to help,” Rian said quietly, eyes still shining with unshed tears. “It’s not fair that you have to do this alone, be on your own.” He leant in and kissed Ambrose with a quiet desperation, breaking it to whisper “I’m scared for you,” before kissing him again.

“I’ll be okay,” Ambrose whispered back. He brought his free hand up to stroke Rian’s cheek with gentle affection. It was going to be so fucking hard to leave. “You made it okay. They won’t be able to track me anymore, Ri. You saved my ass. And once I’ve figured out the rest, when it’s safe, I’ll come back.”

“Promise?”

“When it’s safe,” Ambrose said. “I promise.”

**Author's Note:**

> Come join in on The Mundanes universe at [http://themundanes.tumblr.com](themundanes.tumblr.com).
> 
> There are introductions to the world, headcanons, ficlets, and faceclaims on the blog.
> 
> We always love having more people writing more characters, wherever in the world you want.
> 
> Let's populate the world with Queer Urban Magic kiddos!


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